Every End Is A New Beginning
by Reni-Maniac
Summary: My take on how JAG could end properly. Just something short and sappy.


Summary:  
My take on how JAG could end properly. Just something short and sappy.

Disclaimer:  
JAG belongs to DPB though he isn't playing nice, is he? I suggest we discard him of custody. Anybody interested in taking them all in? We could share.

This came to me last night, instead of sleep so this isn't betaed, ergo every mistake is mine.

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**Every End is a new Beginning**

They were sitting there in silence.

She starred at the man seated across the table. She searched for his eyes. The moment they locked with hers it felt like they were watching right into her soul. For all she knew they've managed to do so from the very start. He had always known about the struggles of her soul, like she'd known of his. He had always managed to look past the 'I'm okay,' that worked so well with every other person. He had always been there when she needed him the most. She had done the same for him. He had always been the one to turn to even when things between them were bad or worse. There had been times when their friendship had been on a steady downward spin. But each time they had pulled a stop to slowly work their way back up again.

Instinctively she reached for his hand to feel this one constant in her life. She found it without her eyes ever leaving his. Immediately his thumb began softly rubbing the back of her hand where it came to rest.

She heard someone ask for their orders. She heard him answer for the both of them. She smiled at how well he knew her. He answered with a smile of his own.

Her thoughts drifted back to the one night all of this had begun when it was supposed to be the end of everything.

He had come by her place for dinner. She had known why he did. He was to say goodbye.

He had wanted to leave; no he had been forced to leave. But still he would be gone all too soon.

She remembered the both of them in her kitchen preparing dinner. They had talked about their friends, the things he would miss most. They had even shared some laughs.

By the time they had been clearing the table all light topics were done and only the unavoidable left unsaid.

They sat in silence. Neither has said a word yet, neither needed to. They just kept smiling at each other reveling in the other's presence, totally lost to the world surrounding them.

She concentrated back on his eyes that were still boring into her. She still found herself wondering just what he saw when he looked at her that way. Long ago he had told her that is was no longer his long lost love that in fact it hadn't been since the day they first kissed.

She often asked herself why it had taken them eight years to realize their feelings when they had been there back then. But then it again it hadn't needed eight years to realize these feelings, but all the years to admit and act on them. Neither had been courageous enough to let go of the lifeline she had accused him of clinging onto but which she had desperately done so herself. It would have taken just a little step of either of them. Just one of them to take the risk. The risk of laying your heart open, to trust the other with all your heart. Why had it been so hard for them to trust with their hearts when they had trusted each other with their lives? Was it because of all the things they had experienced, because of all the hurt they've already been through? Was it because when you trusted your life in somebody else's hands and he fails you won't be there to take the pain but when your heart gets broken there is no way of escaping it? She doesn't know. And right now she no longer cared.

She felt the movement of his thumb stop, leaving behind the pricking of her skin where it has lingered only seconds before.

She returned to that night. When she had stepped back into the room he had waited for her holding out his hand, asking for a last dance. She had willingly stepped into his arms. He had pulled her near. Close. She had buried her face on his shoulder deeply inhaling his scent, trying to take in everything he was, every tiny bit of him so she won't ever forget. She had wrapped her arms around him, clinging onto him banning the thought of him leaving into the back of her mind. As long as she held onto him he couldn't leave.

They had slowly danced to the music softly wavering through the room. She hadn't known how long they danced, she'd long lost her every track of time and the sound of the stereo had drifted into a faraway distance.

"I don't want you to go."

Her words had been muffled by his shoulder. He had heard them nonetheless. He had stopped their slow motion. He hadn't moved at all. And neither had she. She had just stayed in his arms her eyes closed against his shoulders.

"I need you. I need you with me," she had whispered again.

He had softly pushed her back a few inches so he could look into her eyes.

She had seen the light of the room reflected in the water that clouded his eyes. They looked like the bluest ocean she'd ever seen.

"Stay," she had softly urged her eyes begging him to give in.

"I can't but I don't want to go," he had replied.

Tears had started to pool her eyes as well. So now it was all over and all she could do was cry about it. She had felt the hot trail of the first tear on her cheek. Only seconds later it had been replaced by the soft touch of his thumb.

He had pulled her close again, her tears now soaking the fabric of his shirt. His hand had run smoothing circles on her back just below her neck. She had continued to cry her silent tears until there were no more left. He had caressed her through all of them.

"Come with me." He had whispered the words into her hair.

She had backed away a little so she could meet his gaze.

Should she leave her life behind? Her friends? Everything she had? Leave so she could be with him? But hadn't he been the bigger part of her life these last years wouldn't she be left drifting off into the dark when he was gone? Would there be a life for her once he wasn't in it? She'd managed being on her own before but would she be willing to do so again? So everything she could come up with was "Why?" as this was the one question that had made all the difference.

And there they had been the few words she'd waited so long to hear. Now they came without hesitation, "Because I love you."

So now they sat at a small table in a place far from their old lives, far from their friends and far from the place they shared this sole dance eighteen months back.

She registered a waitress filling up their glasses. She felt him retreat his hand to reach for his glass. She took her own as well.

And the moment their glasses met in a single 'cling' their voices came to mingle in the first words of the evening, "Happy first anniversary."

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So how did you like it? 


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